Photo or sports cards have been in existence for some time and the quality and the manufacturing processes are quite varied. The quality of the cards range from, using state of the art printing processes producing collectors cards of professional athletes to the rather crude method of sticking a peel off label onto a photograph. These two processes are far apart in quality.
The cards printed for professional athletes are manufactured and sold in high volumes and therefore much more investment can be undertaken to obtain a high degree of quality. The less expensive souvenir card is custom made in minimum quantities, such as runs of as few as five or twelve cards.
In the past couple of years some custom cards have been produced with the use of digital computer imaging. Even here the quality, while it is much improved over the peel off label cards, is still somewhat less than the professionally produced cards. These latter cards use a process of either printing the images through the use of laser printers or copiers, on laser paper or a thin card stock, and then gluing various thickness of paper together to produce a card of the acceptable thickness and firmness.
Examples of various manufacturing methods of cards and the like are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,282,651; 5,270,101; 5,229,190, 4,773,677; 4,259,391; 4,070,774 , and 4,086,379. These prior art patents generally teach a card where papers containing computer generated image are glued to each other. However, these prior art patents don't provide a simple mechanism for protecting the card from, becoming dog-eared from constant handling, the cracking of the toner on the image with handling of the cards, the smudging, smearing and tearing of the card. These prior art cards are made from "card stock" or multiple sheets of paper glued together to give it acceptable thickness and firmness and are subject to cracking when they are bent back upon themselves. Cracking will also occur when the card is handled over a period of time. The cracking is due to the fact that the toner, being situated on the outside layer of the thickened card, cannot stretch and therefore must crack, or separate in the direction of the bend.
It is therefore, a primary object of this invention to provide a method of manufacturing a card of high quality providing protection against smearing, smudging, tearing and cracking, the card. It is a further objects of this invention to provide a method of manufacturing a handleable card which is protected from being dog-eared through constant handling and use thereof, and the card thereof
Further and other object of this invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art when considering the following summary of the invention and the more detailed description of the preferred embodiments illustrated herein.